Nothing says 'I pity you Dad' like a naked woman or a novelty golf tee.
Father-of-three Jake Wallis Simons is far from impressed with some
rather sinister Father's Day gifts

Ever fantasised about knocking off a naked woman’s head with a golf club? You have? Then have I got the product for you!

Produced by Dunlop and others, it’s a golf tee in the shape of a headless female form. You place the ball where the head should be, and hey presto: you can both knock the bitch out of the park and drive towards the hole. Talk about two birdies and one stone.

To some, this is the perfect Father’s Day gift. To others, of course, it is naked misogyny. Personally, I fall firmly in the latter camp. But why give you a whole sentence when three letters will do? W T actual F?

(In fact, I feel like tracking down the manufacturers and giving them a taste of their own golf tees. At the very least, I hope they withdraw this product.)

On the whole, I argued, many are profoundly depressing, casting men as obsessed only with boobs, beer, football, telly and violence. Stupid, in other words.

Aprons depicting naked female torsos; a T-Shirt that says “keep calm, drink beer, watch footie”; a bell to ring when it’s “beer o’clock”; a wine-stopper in the shape of an erection. In the imagination of the people who produce this stuff, if you’re male you’ve got to be an idiot.

But if these products are demeaning to men – and they are – they are far more demeaning to women. And in a far more sinister way.

You don’t have to be a professional feminist to feel sick to the stomach at the idea of rehearsing misogynistic assault while relaxing on the golf course of a weekend. But it doesn’t stop with the golf tee.

But these pale into insignificance when you consider products like the golf tee. Or the naked lady beer glass (you can drink out of the bitch’s neck! ‘Raay!). Or the cigarette lighters and pipes in the shape of a naked female torso. And so on.

The most disturbing aspect of these products is the fact that they lack heads. This is objectification at its most extreme, and from that point it’s obviously only a small step to violence. (Dr Caroline Heldman, an American political scientist,gave a moving Ted talk on the subject.)

Although I am, of course, fully behind the odd couple’s campaign, I couldn’t help but worry that the impact of a conference in London may be a little diffused by the time it reaches the Democratic Republic of Congo.

But we all wish it every success. And if campaigns like these are indeed to change the world, it would help – don’t you think? – if small-minded manufacturers stopped making products inspired by violence against women.